John Pate of Pate's Orchard just called to say the orchard made it through the latest freeze with minimal damage - it got down to 26 degrees which mean some of the crop was lost but, ever the optimist, John says that will just save them a lot of thinning time and result in bigger peaches.We don't have the full report on strawberries yet. Several of our smaller strawberry growers report no damage. Fredrickson Farms lost all their blooms in the freeze last week and haven't uncovered the plants yet to see what this week's freeze might have done. As long as the plants are not damaged (and they should not be), the berry harvest will just be be shorter than usual.
The high tunnel tomatoes are thriving. John Pate and Tim Green report fruit on the vine and Hector Troyer said his weathered the freeze fine despite an outside temperature of 23 degrees.
Photo at top by Barb Pate. Below, John Pate shows Resa Amos his high tunnel during the spring market inspection in March.
